


Use Your Noodle

by ProblemWithTrouble



Series: Pacific Rim [7]
Category: Pacific Rim (Movies)
Genre: First Kiss, M/M, Pining, Post Movie
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-05
Updated: 2019-05-05
Packaged: 2020-02-26 18:00:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,888
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18722131
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ProblemWithTrouble/pseuds/ProblemWithTrouble
Summary: “How was your date?”Jules shrugged. “Fine. Not going anywhere if that’s what you’re asking.”“It’s not.”Jules got the same smile she did whenever she was about to say something off the wall that he was supposed to decode and laugh at the joke with. He was only fast enough about three-quarters of the time. “He seemed a little preoccupied with his ex. Old flames rekindled and all that.”Nate raked his mind for anyone that Jake had been close with before he’d been kicked out of the PPDC by his dad. There wasn’t a lot. And there certainly wasn’t a lot left alive. Maybe there had been a J-Tech he’d been into that Nate hadn’t known about? Was he preoccupied if they were dead? He wasn’t the type to get hung up on people who were alive and not do anything about it.Jules’s laugh was sharp and loud and seemed to surprise even her. “Are you trying to tell me that you two never dated?”





	Use Your Noodle

Jules and Nate had been sleeping together for a few months. Nothing serious. They’d never even been on a date, but after Tokyo she’d asked him out and he’d said yes. He had to move on from his weird, persistent crush on Jake some time, right? Even if he was back and he did say that Jake’s face was pretty that didn’t mean anything. So, Nate was moving on with more than just sex. He was going to actually try this time. 

He’d dated a few people, but nothing that could be called a relationship. Or at least not a good relationship. He could be a real dick, he knew. But he liked to think that he could be sweet to the right person. And he was going to find that right person that wasn’t Jake and was totally Jules if it fucking killed him. 

He walked out of his own room – one of the many advantages of being an actual ranger was no more bunks – and went to meet Jules at the delivery bay that doubled as the only way into the city from the ‘dome. Outside he checked the time, he was five minutes early and was the first one there. Two minutes later Jake walked out of the door. They gave each other a confused look then a nod and tight smile in unison. 

They stood six feet apart, enough that they didn’t have to talk but not far enough that it would look like either of them was avoiding the other, for another minute. Then Jules walked out with a smile and gave them each her own confused look. “Did you two have another fight?” she asked with a laugh. 

Both Jake and Nate took steps towards her as Jake said “Nah, I was just waiting for you,” and Nate said “No, but I didn’t need to chat while I waited.”

They both turned to each other then back to Jules, who wasn’t doing a very good job of pretending not to laugh. 

“I thought,” Jake started. 

“I asked you both out.”

“On a date?” Nate asked. 

“Is this really a difficult concept for you, Lambert?” She was laughing again, which was good. And not good. 

“Oh.” Jake looked like he was actually mulling it over and Nate needed to bail. Fast. 

“Sorry. I can’t.” 

Jules looked genuinely shocked and it took a lot to make her do that. 

“I didn’t know it was for both of us. I’m more of a one gal or one guy or one-person type of person.” He was moving his hands, but he didn’t know how or why. God, why was he nervous? “So, you two have fun. I’m going to go back inside.” And he did. He walked with all the confidence he could muster when he had just chickened out of a threesome with the two hottest people in the ‘dome. Maybe on Earth. 

Forcing himself to move on from his teenage crush was one thing, but he couldn’t if Jake was there too. Jules was great and a part of him saw a potential with her, a desire for something real with her, but they weren’t on the same field that they were with Jake. It wasn’t fair to her. Or was it not fair to him? He needed to stop thinking about this.

* * *

As it turned out, not thinking about Jules and Jake was impossible. He spent the whole night kicking himself for bailing. At the very least Jules and Jake would think he was some uptight close-minded traditionalist and at worst he’d be the guy who had freaked out at the very possibility of being with Jake and Jules and couldn’t find his cool if there had been GPS. The fact that the second was closer to the truth was not great for his spiraling mind at one in the morning when he was watching Netflix reality shows and trying not to think. 

The next morning when he saw Jules in the mess he sat down across from her as he had for years. They were still friends after all. And if he could be cool now maybe it would make up for his weirdness the night before. “Hey.”

“Hey.”

“How was your date?” 

Jules shrugged. “Fine. Not going anywhere if that’s what you’re asking.”

“It’s not.” 

Jules got the same smile she did whenever she was about to say something off the wall that he was supposed to decode and laugh at the joke with. He was only fast enough about three-quarters of the time. “He seemed a little preoccupied with his ex. Old flames rekindled and all that.” 

Nate raked his mind for anyone that Jake had been close with before he’d been kicked out of the PPDC by his dad. There wasn’t a lot. And there certainly wasn’t a lot left alive. Maybe there had been a J-Tech he’d been into that Nate hadn’t known about? Was he preoccupied if they were dead? He wasn’t the type to get hung up on people who were alive and not do anything about it.

Jules’s laugh was sharp and loud and seemed to surprise even her. “Are you trying to tell me that you two never dated?”

“No.”

“Never?”

“Never.”

Jules looked stunned for a moment. “That’s a bet I would have lost.” 

The mess was loud enough that he didn’t think he needed to worry about anyone hearing them, but he still wished she would stop. “We were drift partners. We were close.” 

“Lambert. I know Mako wasn’t your sister, but you did see her and Raleigh in the same room together. They never acted like you two.” 

“They were way more in sync than Jake and I ever were,” he shot back.

She pointed her spoon at him, disappointed in him again. “Yeah. They also saw each other regularly, not just ignoring each other for ten years. But that’s not what I’m talking about and you know it.” 

“I don’t.” Nate held her stare until she rolled her eyes so hard her head rolled too. 

“You two are impossible.”

“What do you want me to say, Jules?”

“That you’ll ask him out.” She stuffed one last bite of oatmeal in her mouth and left before Nate could respond. 

“Ask who out?” Jake appeared at his side with his own tray of food and sat, biting into a muffin. 

“No one,” Nate said, stabbing at his own oatmeal.

Jake rolled his eyes. “Okay.”

* * *

Nate was in the gym trying to run himself to exhaustion so that he could get some sleep that night. He also needed to get back into fighting form after his injury and spending hours trying to break Newt away from the Precursors didn’t exactly give a lot of opportunity for exercise. 

It was pushing 11 o’clock and no one was in the gym, it was the smaller of the two in the ‘dome anyway. It had been the Kwoon, back in the day, but when drifting technology made it less dangerous for two people to link minds and gave drift compatibility a wider range, they had put some exercise equipment in it and called it a Ranger specific training room. Then they had decided that having a separate training room for just rangers made them isolated even more than they already tended to do themselves. They lifted the Ranger specification and left the equipment. 

Of course, his peace was ruined when Jake walked in and made a beeline for the treadmill Nate was on. “So, half the ‘dome thinks we used to date.” 

Cutting right to the chase then. “Okay.”

“The only person I spoke to today who thinks that we didn’t is Hermann. And that’s just because he was here when we were cadets and suspects that if we had dated ‘it would not have been a secret as you would have done anything at that age to get your father’s attention and kissing Ranger Lambert in the middle of the mess certainly would not have been off limits’.” Jake finished imitating Hermann by jumping on the front of the treadmill and hanging onto the display. Nate kept running. 

“Do you want me to send a memo saying we didn’t?”

“It doesn’t bug you that people think goody-two-shoes Nate dated family-disappointment Jake?” 

“No.” Nate jumped and put his feet on the side of the treadmill as it continued to run. “You got kicked out because you and I got into an argument and you pulled a stunt that could have killed you. And me getting mad that you never came back didn’t exactly do much for the rumors that we had been secretly dating the whole time. I accepted that a long time ago.” He jumped back to start running again. 

“This place is like a fucking fishbowl.” 

Nate just kept running. 

“Why did you get so bent that I never came back?”

“You were my drift partner.” 

“Dad would have never let me back and after… It wouldn’t have mattered.” 

The timer finally dinged and started to automatically slow down the treadmill to a stop. “They were always going to come back.”

“Newt being mind-controlled was a twist.” 

Nate let himself laugh and shake his head. He hopped off the treadmill, his legs only feeling a little like jelly and he was only a little out of breath from trying to hold a conversation and running. He controlled his breathing so that Jake wouldn’t know the strain on his lungs.

Jake came to stand in front of him, only half a foot apart. Distance had always been a problem for them, always too much or not enough.

“Jules was right. You should ask him out.”

“You don’t even know who you’re talking about.”

“I do. Because she told me.”

“Really? And who did she tell you I should ask out?”

“Me.” 

Nate really hadn’t been expecting that one. For all Jules’s playing and jokes she didn’t usually sell people out like that. “And what would you say if I did? Huh?”

“Ask me and find out. Or…are you too much of a chicken?”

One of these days Nate was really going to need to learn how not to raise to Jake’s bait. He took the last half step forward, so they were all but chest to chest. “Fine. Jake, will you go on a date with me?” 

Jake’s smile lit up his whole face and looked a little too proud of himself. “Only if you take me to that noodle place we used to go to in the Academy.” 

Nate had an odd sense of vertigo and Jake’s words sank in. He’d known, deep in his bones, that Jake would say no. Now he was wrong, and his head was spinning. “Okay. But you have to pay for drinks after.” 

“Fine. Is this the part where we make out or do you need to talk some more?” 

Nate leaned forward just a little and Jake met him halfway and suddenly they were kissing. Just like that. Like it was easy. Like it didn’t make Nate’s head feel light, though that might have been the fact that he hadn’t gotten his breath back from running and he didn’t want to stop kissing to breathe. He just needed to remember where that damn noodle shop was.

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first foray into the land of lamcost. I saw the movie for the first time last night and oh those two are so in love!!! Their lack of fics is criminal.
> 
> (also if anyone wants to send a prompt for these two I will happily take it)


End file.
